Generally, representative democracies are based on the free election of individuals to representative office and/or electoral questions on laws or regulations (e.g., ballot referenda and the like). Faith in elections is often considered fundamental to the function of free societies. As the size of communities and registered voters has grown, local election departments have transitioned from hand-counted elections to machine-counted elections. In a machine-counted election, vote readers interpret marked ballots (e.g., voter-marked ballots) to determine whether the ballot indicates a voter's intended vote. The vote readers count the number of marked ballots and communicate with a vote tabulator that accumulates the vote totals from the vote readers. The accumulated vote totals are used to determine the election winner(s). Each vote reader and/or vote tabulator is programmed to read and/or analyze ballots to discern voter intent. The programming is generally proprietary to the company making the reader/tabulator and is thus susceptible to fears about errors or hacking resulting in erroneous or fraudulent election results.
An election department typically certifies an election result based, at least in part, on the accumulated vote totals from the vote tabulator. If an election is contested, a recount (either machine or manual) normally occurs prior to election certification. After certification, a party dissatisfied with an election result is left without recourse. During a recount, ballots are manually examined and evaluated to discern voter intent. Voter intent is evaluated based on markings on the marked ballot, typically in areas on the ballot that are designated for voter intent such as markable ovals. Additionally, voter intent can be discerned based on a particular marking in the context of other markings on the ballot for other elections.
Typically, an election recount is a laborious, time-intensive, and expensive process. As a prominent example, the recount in the 2000 presidential election proceedings in Florida took approximately thirty-six days. More recently, in the 2008 senatorial recount proceedings in Minnesota took approximately eight months. These delays led to uncertainty and expense while the winner of the election was in question. Another concern is a situation in which an error in vote reading or tabulating is not determined or known, in which case a recount that might otherwise be implemented before certification is not effected, possibly resulting in the person receiving the most actual votes not taking office or a question that garnered enough actual votes to pass not passing (or vice versa).
Because of the human element in a voter marking a ballot, the vote reader must make certain determinations about whether a marking constitutes a vote (sometimes called an adjudicated vote). The vote reader can also determine whether a marking constitutes a non-vote, an over-vote (i.e., more votes than the election rules permit for that election), and an under-vote (i.e., fewer votes than the election rules permit for that election). The vote reader may miss a marking that constitutes a vote (e.g., referred to as uncaptured voter intent) or a marginal vote (e.g., a marking that, by itself, does not indicate intent but, in the context of the other markings on the ballot can be used to infer intent).
Additionally, each election department or district is often responsible for administering its own elections, including generation or printing of ballots, counting ballots, and certifying the counted votes. Because many elections are local or district- or precinct-specific, ballots tend to be unique. Differences in ballots and ballot types make universal auditing solutions difficult to implement economically.